With the EU about to activate its sustainable aviation fuel blending mandate, the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) has released an assessment of Europe’s preparedness to deliver required volumes of SAF up to 2030. The blending requirement will escalate from a minimum 2% of jet fuel composition by the end of 2025 to 70% in 2050 for supplies dispensed at airports across the EU’s 27 member states. EASA concludes that by 2030, when the blending mandate reaches 6%, there will be sufficient European production of SAF through multiple pathways to meet the requirements of the ReFuelEU Aviation regulation, which governs the mandate. But it warns rapid action is needed to ensure that a sub-target, initially 0.7%, is achieved for the use of increasingly important synthetic aviation fuels, or e-fuels.

The EASA report, titled ‘State of the EU SAF market in 2023’, examines the capacity of member states to produce the new fuels during the next five years, based on an assessment of the sector’s performance in 2023 and the addition of updated projections. The report, EASA’s first on this subject, also provides real or estimated reference prices for multiple types of current and future aviation fuels and outlines emerging trends in European SAF production.

“This first report on SAF provides a comprehensive analysis and valuable insights to the potential of sustainable aviation fuels for commercial airline operations in Europe,” commented Maria Rueda, EASA’s Strategy and Safety Management Director. “It will be a key component on the journey towards a more sustainable and environmentally friendly aviation sector.”  

EASA says the minimum SAF volume required by 2030 under the ReFuelEU Aviation (RFEUA) programme is around 2.8 million tonnes based on forecast jet fuel consumption of 46 million tonnes and a mandated blending level which, by then, will be at least 6%.

But it qualifies that the SAF production market is “inherently volatile”, impacted by factors including high capital expenditure, feedstock supply chain limitations and the risks to investors of supporting technologies in their early stages. “While many projects are announced,” adds EASA, “some may not reach commercialisation.”

The report presents three scenarios for SAF production in EU countries: Operating, Realistic and Optimistic.

The ‘Operating’ scenario covers only those facilities currently producing SAF, which are expected to deliver just over 1 million tonnes of product by 2030.

The ‘Realistic’ assumption estimates 3.2 million tonnes of SAF will be produced and distributed by facilities already operating, under construction or with small pilot plants either activated or being built. This includes co-processing of SAF in existing refineries.  

The ‘Optimistic’ case predicts 5.5 million tonnes, including pipeline production from projects which have announced elements including technology, feedstock, SAF capacity, commissioning year, location and technical partners, but are yet to be built.

“The Realistic case led to the exclusion of facilities which had not gone through final investment decision (FID) at the time of assessment,” says the report, singling out e-fuels as an example.

“There is a strong pipeline of synthetic aviation fuel projects in the EU, estimated at 1.1 million tonnes by 2030, but at the time of assessment none of these facilities had gone through FID. They were therefore not included in the realistic capacity estimation.”

The report says the hydrotreated esters and fatty acids (HEFA) process, which encompasses converted vegetable oils, waste oils, greases and fats, is the major SAF production pathway, supported by additional supplies through co-processing facilities.

It adds that immature technology for other SAF production pathways including Alcohol-to-Jet (AtJ) and Fischer-Tropsch (FT) prevented them from delivering commercial volumes of the fuel during the study reference year, 2023.

As well, says EASA, the AtJ process of converting alcohols into SAF disqualifies the fuel in the EU because the alcohols are fermented from food crops including corn and sugarcane. 

Additional pathways, including Sun-to-Liquid (StL) and Hydrothermal Liquidation (HtL), are also under development. “However,” says the report, “they remain immature, with only a couple of pilot plants announced, and their contribution to commercial SAF volumes is projected to be negligible by 2030.”

Synthetic aviation fuel is required to comprise at least 1.2% of jet fuel makeup by 2030, which EASA calculates to be a 600,000-tonne requirement. Also known as Power-to-Liquid, or PtL, this process combines water with renewable electricity to extract green hydrogen, which is then combined with captured CO2 to create SAF and other products such as renewable diesel.

“Within the EU,” says the EASA report, “more than 15 synthetic aviation fuel production facilities have been announced, primarily in countries with considerable renewable electricity capacity or infrastructure.”

However, it adds, the requirement for large volumes of renewable electricity, the costs of producing the power and limited sources of eligible carbon in many key locations drives up the costs of e-fuels.  

“The resulting production price is currently non-competitive with other forms of SAF production, particularly HEFA. Therefore, the development of synthetic aviation fuels is likely to be driven by the RFEUA sub-mandate that requires their supply.”

Of eight current or future aviation fuel categories, the report lists market prices or production cost estimates in 2023, reflecting vast premiums for non-fossil product. EASA used price reporting agency (PRA) references to provide benchmarks for price assessments or a basis for estimates.

“Whereas 2023 prices for conventional aviation fuels and aviation biofuels were available through multiple PRA indexes,” said EASA, “the market for other RFEUA aviation fuel types was either non-existent or not yet liquid enough to determine actual reference market prices for 2023. For these fuel types, a bottom-up production cost estimation was developed to provide indicative results.”

The report listed the average 2023 market price of conventional aviation fuel at €816 ($850) per tonne and aviation biofuels at €2,768 ($2,880) per tonne, the latter with an estimated production cost of €1,770 ($1,840) per tonne.

Because none of the other fuel categories had a market price in 2023, production cost estimates were produced by EASA.

Production costs for recycled carbon aviation fuels were estimated to average €2,125 per tonne, while advanced aviation biofuels averaged €2,675 per tonne, low carbon hydrogen for aviation averaged €4,700 per tonne, synthetic low carbon aviation fuels averaged €5,300 per tonne and renewable hydrogen for aviation averaged €6,925 per tonne.

But by far the largest estimates were those for synthetic aviation fuels, the average production cost of which EASA lists as €7,500 per tonne.

The same average estimate – €7,500 per tonne – also applied to synthetic fuel produced with CO2 captured at the industrial source of emission or that made from biogenic CO2.

The most expensive production cost estimated was for fuel produced with CO2 captured from the atmosphere, averaging €8,225 per tonne – more than 10 times the 2023 average market price of conventional jet fuel.

“To be able to meet the synthetic aviation fuel minimum shares, announced synthetic aviation fuel facilities would need to reach FID within the next couple of years,” says the EASA report.  

“On top of this, continuous scale-up in SAF capacity would be needed to comply with RFEUA by 2035, as the minimum SAF share required increases from 6% to 20% by that date.”

The report, developed with the support of consultancy ICF, is a precursor to a first EASA annual technical report due in 2025.

Photo: OMV

Tony Harrington

Correspondent

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As the UK pursues its ‘Jet Zero’ target of net zero emissions from its aviation sector by 2050, a raft of new initiatives by government and industry have taken place over the past week. To coincide with the Sustainable Skies event held at Farnborough on April 17, the eighth meeting of the Jet Zero Council, which is made up of government, industry and academic representatives, revealed an action plan for the next two years covering zero emission aircraft development and sustainable aviation fuel production. The event also saw a fly-past by an RAF Airbus A330 partly powered by SAF that had undertaken a training air-to-air refuelling exercise over the North Sea. The government also published an independent report on developing a UK SAF industry, and UK industry group Sustainable Aviation unveiled an updated version of its Net Zero Carbon Road-Map. Meanwhile, LanzaTech has revealed plans by its UK subsidiary for Wales’ first SAF production plant and low-cost airline Wizz Air has announced an investment in UK sewage-to-SAF company Firefly.

The Jet Zero Council, which is jointly chaired by the government’s Transport Secretary and Energy Security and Net Zero Secretary, adopted its two-year plan with actions to speed up the design, manufacture and rollout of zero emission aircraft and the required infrastructure at UK airports. It also sets out how the Council will help to accelerate SAF production through investment in first-of-a-kind SAF plants, supporting scientific research on a larger scale and help to drive down production costs. The Council meeting also agreed to set up a group to advance knowledge and mitigation options on the non-CO2 impacts of aviation.

“This government is a determined partner to the aviation industry – helping accelerate new technology and fuels, modernise their operations and work internationally to remove barriers to progress,” commented Transport Secretary Mark Harper. “Together, we can set aviation up for success, continue harnessing its huge social and economic benefits, and ensure it remains a core part of the UK’s sustainable economic future.”

The centrepiece of the drive to have 10% of the annual aviation jet fuel mix, roughly 1.2 million tonnes, made up of SAF by 2030 is a SAF blending mandate, on which a second government consultation recently started under a tight policy process to have the full details confirmed later this year or early 2024 and legislated by the final quarter of 2024, ready to start in 2025. By then, it is hoped that at least five commercial-scale SAF plants will be under construction. As well as the mandate, through its Advanced Fuels Fund, the government has put up grants totalling £165 million ($205m) to help first-of-a-kind projects get off the ground.

However, there is a groundswell of opinion that this will not be enough to attract the large outside investment required, and other policy instruments, such as a price stability mechanism, will be required. Last October, the Department for Transport (DfT) commissioned an independent report to be undertaken by Philip New, former CEO of the Energy Systems Catapult and BP Alternative Energy, “to help understand the conditions needed to create a viable long-term SAF industry in the UK.”

The report’s framing section asks the basic questions of whether producing SAF is a rational use of renewable energy resources, whether emerging alternative aircraft technologies could render SAF redundant or if the UK needs a material domestic SAF manufacturing base. If the answer is affirmative to these questions, the second section proposes a set of possible interventions that “would support the creation of a competitive, sustainable and enduring UK SAF industry.”

New’s findings show SAF is indeed key to aviation decarbonisation and the UK has the potential to play a leading role, particularly in the development and deployment of SAF made from waste streams, a technology close to readiness. Whilst the proposed mandate “is a very promising market shaping mechanism”, he found a consensus that it needed to be supported by other interventions to attract investment in UK supply. Key interventions with the greatest leverage, he says, would support the UK’s nascent advantage in feedstock supply and underpin revenue confidence.

“There could be a powerful synergy between standards, the mandate and a bilateral public law contract type of mechanism, for example, akin to the Contracts for Difference (CfD) scheme used in the renewable power sector,” he says. “There is potential for this to be underwritten by industry, not government.”

His report concludes: “With the imaginative application of market-shaping levers, the UK’s concentration of developers with potential projects, remarkable cross-sectoral commitment, legacy strengths in aviation technology and fuels infrastructure, and potential strengths in feedstock access, financing could be leveraged to build a SAF industry with only a limited call on public finances. Such an industry would create thousands of green jobs and support fuel supply security.”

In its response to the report, the DfT says: “The government will continue to consider whether additional support is required alongside delivery of our existing commitments on the Advanced Fuels Fund and SAF mandate. There are a number of options which could be considered to help address the revenue certainty barrier for SAF plants in the UK. Any further support will be tested for deliverability, investability, affordability and simplicity.

“One option to provide revenue certainty could be the private law contract mechanism recommended in the report, though this type of scheme has never been implemented in parallel to a mandate before in the UK, or globally. The government must therefore consider how any potential support mechanism would interact with the SAF mandate and other incentive mechanisms such as the UK ETS, ensuring that it operates successfully in tandem and avoids unintended consequences. Furthermore, designing and implementing a mechanism such as a private law contract is likely to be complex and take time to implement, particularly a bespoke CfD scheme.

“We will work together with industry through the Jet Zero Council to consider the best way to support the aviation industry to decarbonise, including considering options for additional revenue certainty for a UK SAF industry to be provided via an industry-funded intervention. If required, following further engagement, we will launch a formal government consultation this summer.”

To coincide with the Council meeting and the Sustainable Skies World Summit 2023 event, which attracted 7 the Royal Air Force flew its Airbus A330 Voyager air-to-air refuelling tanker, which also operates as a VIP passenger and freight aircraft, in a round-trip from its Brize Norton base. Carrying a 43% blend of SAF in both engines, the aircraft performed an air-to-air refuel over the North Sea before a fly-over of the Farnborough Airport runway. The 50 tonnes of SAF used for the flight was sourced and funded by International Airlines Group and supplied by Air bp.

New industry net zero roadmap

The meeting also saw the launch of the UK cross-industry group Sustainable Aviation’s Net Zero Carbon Road-Map, which updates previous versions published in 2020 and 2021.

“This is a critical decade where aviation must prove it will decarbonise. Our updated roadmap shows that we have a clear, credible path to take carbon out of flying,” commented Matt Gorman, Chair, Sustainable Aviation. “Through a combination of sustainable aviation fuel, more efficient aircraft and airspace, zero emission planes and carbon removals, we can protect the huge benefits of aviation for future generations without the carbon cost.”

However, he said, decarbonisation would happen faster and create more jobs and investment with the right government policy support.

“The US and Europe are surging forwards in the race to create new industries in sustainable aviation fuels and technology. The UK has all the natural advantages to be able to join them, but we need to move quickly. An agreed mandate for SAF as soon as possible and a price support mechanism – building on Philip New’s independent report – are key policy areas where we can act now to gain a share of the huge prize of making Britain the natural home of net zero aviation.”

The industry group calls on the government to deliver commercial UK SAF production at scale this decade and the commitment on the five plants being under construction by 2025 by providing an industry-funded price stability mechanism alongside the mandate, and prioritising access to UK sustainable feedstocks.

It also asks for the acceleration of the UK airspace modernisation programme, with completion by the end of the decade, and investment by government in zero carbon emission flight technology through increased matched funding to the Aerospace Technology Institute programme. It also calls for residual aviation carbon emissions to be addressed by accelerating the rollout of carbon removals, including them in the UK ETS “and ensuring aviation’s fair share”.

The roadmap shows the industry plans to reduce its carbon emissions by nearly 70 million tonnes to net zero by 2050 (see below), compared with a scenario of growth at today’s efficiency, broken down as follows:

• 9.6 MtCO2 saving due to decarbonisation cost impact on demand;
• 2.5 MtCO2 saving from better air traffic management and operating procedures;
• 9.5 MtCO2 saving from the introduction of known and new, more efficient aircraft;
• 10.6 MtCO2 saving from the introduction of future, more efficient types including electric and hydrogen aircraft;
• 26.4 MtCO2 saving from sustainable aviation fuels; and
• 8.8 MtCO2 saving from permanent carbon removals.

“With these actions, the UK will be able to accommodate significant growth in passengers through to 2050 whilst reducing emission levels from just under 40 million tonnes of CO2 per year down to zero,” says the roadmap report, which adds that a full and detailed technical report on the Road-Map will be published later this year and further work will be carried out during the year on non-CO2 impacts.

Accompanying the Road-Map is a Sustainable Aviation-commissioned report by consultants ICF called ‘Roadmap for the development of the UK SAF industry’. It says 1.2 million tonnes (MT) of SAF will be required in 2030 to meet the government ambition, increasing to 7.0 MT by 2050 to achieve net zero in a central case with 75% of residual carbon addressed through SAF. Announced SAF capacity in the UK is around 0.6 MT, so at least 0.6 MT remains to be met by unannounced capacity or imports, although relying on imports will be challenging, it says, with a global shortfall in announced capacity compared to targets of almost 4 Mt of SAF by 2030, equal to over three times the UK’s projected 2030 demand.

The analysis shows the UK has sufficient feedstock – biological and other – to fully decarbonise the aviation sector. In the central estimate, the roadmap conservatively estimates feedstock availability for 3.5 MT of SAF from waste and advanced feedstocks, and 1.9 MT from renewable electricity.

However, utilising UK feedstock requires new conversion technologies to be commercialised. The HEFA pathway dominates current SAF production but the waste fats and oils this approach requires are limited in their availability, and to achieve the necessary growth, technologies such as Fischer-Tropsch, alcohol-to-jet and others must be commercialised, says the roadmap report.

“These technologies hold great promise but will not be feasible without additional support,” it comments. “The high capital costs, uncertain revenue and complex technologies prevent investments until the level, type and longevity of policy support is known and sufficient. The Advanced Fuel Fund (AFF) has set the groundwork but additional support is urgently needed. Time is running short to get these complex facilities built and commissioned by 2030.”

New UK SAF production plans

One beneficiary of the AFF is LanzaTech UK’s Dragon project, which was awarded £25 million ($31m) last December in the first round of the fund to aid development of a commercial-scale plant in Port Talbot, Wales, that will convert steel mill off-gases into ethanol and then use LanzaJet’s alcohol-to-jet (AtJ) technology to produce SAF.

LanzaTech UK, a subsidiary of LanzaTech Global Inc, has now announced further plans for the project, which include seeking planning permission for the AtJ plant in the South Wales industrial heartland that would produce around 100 million litres of SAF per year, enough to supply around 1% of the UK’s jet fuel needs. The plans have been developed in consultation with Neath Port Talbot Council, Natural Resources Wales, Associated British Ports and the Welsh government. Subject to planning permission, which will be applied for later this year, construction of the plant is expected to begin in 2025, with production starting in 2026/7.

To produce ethanol for the plant, a second facility is planned that uses a naturally occurring organism that transforms greenhouse gases to ethanol as part of its natural lifecycle. The details of this gas fermentation facility would be progressed through a separate planning application when the location has been identified and confirmed, said the company.

“LanzaTech is thrilled to announce its plans to transform derelict land in Port Talbot into the site for Wales’ first sustainable aviation fuel production,” commented LanzaTech UK’s Managing Director, Jim Woodger. “The rich industrial heritage of the region will be maintained through innovative technologies like these that transform industrial waste gases into valuable products and create long-term, skilled jobs.”

LanzaTech said it would be sharing further details of its plans for the AtJ facility in the coming months and is seeking feedback from the local community on Project Dragon through a newly-launched website.

Meanwhile, fast-growing European low-cost carrier Wizz Air has announced a £5 million ($6.2m) investment in UK biofuel company Firefly, which is developing a process that converts sewage sludge into SAF. The investment, a first of its kind for Wizz Air, will support development and certification of the SAF and the airline expects to be able to use the fuel in its UK operations from 2028 under an offtake agreement to supply up to 525,000 tonnes over 15 years that would potentially save 1.5 million tonnes of CO2e. Wizz Air says the saving is equal to the emissions of over 12,000 flights between London and its home base, Budapest.

Firefly says more than 57 million tonnes of low-value sewage sludge are produced in the UK each year, with the potential to produce 250,000 tonnes of SAF. The SAF produced by Firefly will be independently certified by standards body RSB and is projected to deliver a 90% reduction in GHG emissions compared with fossil jet fuel on a lifecycle basis.

“The investment will accelerate the commercialisation of our game-changing process,” commented James Hygate, CEO of Firefly Green Fuels. “The feedstock, sewage sludge, is available in vast quantities globally and we can put it to a truly beneficial use, reducing the use of fossil fuels in the hardest to decarbonise areas.”

Firefly’s technology originated in the laboratories of Green Fuels, founded in 2003 and awarded a Royal Warrant in 2013. The current SAF project encompasses engineering design and construction of a demonstrator plant capable of generating the quantities of fuel to allow ASTM qualification. This in turn, said the company, would lead to a first-of-its-kind commercial refinery and rollout to several UK locations where airports, pipeline terminals and wastewater treatment works are in close proximity.

Photo: Refuelling of the RAF’s Voyager Airbus A330 with a SAF blend supplied by IAG and Air bp

Christopher Surgenor

Editor

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Following its successful bid for UK government funding of £1 million ($1.2m), Virgin Atlantic says it expects to conduct the first-ever net zero transatlantic flight to be powered by 100% sustainable aviation fuel in November. The airline has put together a consortium with six partners – Boeing, Rolls-Royce, Imperial College London, University of Sheffield, ICF and Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) – and is forming up to seven working groups for what it describes as a highly challenging project. Virgin is targeting the Rolls-Royce engine-powered Boeing 787 flight between London Heathrow and New York JFK to carry non-paying passengers, subject to approval by regulators, a representative from the airline told a UK SAF conference. The flight is part of the UK government’s ‘Jet Zero’ strategy to decarbonise the UK aviation sector, with SAF as one of the main tools for achieving a target of net zero emissions by 2050. To create a demand for SAF, the government is introducing a mandated obligation on fuel suppliers from 2025. A Department for Transport (DfT) official said a second consultation on the mandate will be launched shortly, with a final policy decision expected later this year.

Virgin is looking to acquire around 60 tonnes of HEFA fuel with a 12% synthetic aromatic content, of which 45-50 tonnes will be used for the transatlantic flight and the remainder for testing and approvals purposes, Luke Ervine, the airline’s Head of Sustainability, informed delegates at the Sustainable Aviation Fuel Supply Chain Initiative event in Leeds organised by Innovate UK KTN, a government agency tasked with accelerating the creation of a UK SAF industry, and supported by the DfT and industry group Sustainable Aviation.

“We’d love to have passengers onboard but that is going to involve a lot of conversations at a high level with the UK CAA and DfT,” said Ervine. “Everything will be grounded in safety and we will be led by the approvals process.”

He said the airline was currently considering commercial agreements with potential UK suppliers for the HEFA fuel requirement and the synthetic aromatic kerosene would need to be imported from the United States as there was only one supplier at present.

Virgin is working with the University of Sheffield on fuel analysis and ICF on lifecycle assessment and emissions reduction validation. Another working group, involving RMI and Imperial College, will focus on climate-warming contrail formation to better understand the roles SAF and route planning can play in their avoidance. US-based RMI has recently formed a cross-sector task force, which includes Imperial College, to explore opportunities to address the warming impact of contrails.

Imperial’s Dr Marc Stettler told the conference non-CO2 effects, particularly from ice crystal contrail formations in the upper atmosphere caused by water vapour and soot particles from jet engine exhausts, were at least as important as CO2 in terms of the overall climate impact of aviation, which taken together contribute around 3.5% to total anthropogenic radiative forcing.

Pointing to research carried out by NASA and the German Aerospace Center (DLR), Stettler said there was evidence that cleaner-burning jet fuels made from sustainable sources can produce 50-70% fewer ice crystal contrails at cruising altitude. Given that only a small number of flights, particularly those flying at dusk or dawn, or in wintertime, were responsible for most of the warming contrails, he suggested there were potentially significant climate benefits by targeting the use of SAF on these flights.

In addition to the use of SAF, the Virgin flight will focus attention on flight efficiency and route optimisation, and to ensure it is completely net zero, residual emissions will be removed through biochar carbon credits purchased from the carbon market.

“We intend collecting all the data and create an open source information platform across industry stakeholders to share the lessons learned and help others with their own operations,” said Ervine.

Hazel Schofield, Deputy Head of Low Carbon Fuels at the UK Department for Transport, said the government mandate would ensure 10% of UK jet fuel by 2030, around 1.5 billion litres, was made up of SAF produced from wastes, with a separate target for power-to-liquid fuels. A cap would be placed on HEFA fuels to encourage new-generation fuels produced from gasification/FT and alcohol-to-jet technologies.

She said the impending government consultation would include full details of what will be included in the legislation and how the 2030 target was to be achieved. The government is also setting up a SAF clearing house to help potential UK SAF producers access testing capacity in the UK for certification purposes rather than ship fuel abroad for testing. Schofield said the DfT hoped to announce a delivery partner shortly.

Other than decarbonisation, she said the government had three main priorities for setting up a UK SAF industry: fuel resilience so the UK was not reliant on imported fuels, opportunities for UK green economic growth and also for green jobs. However, there were four barriers to investment in SAF:

• Feedstock access;
• Technologies required for conversion;
• Construction of plants; and
• Revenue uncertainty

She said the government has commissioned an independent review of the challenges and a report would be published shortly, after consideration by ministers.

“Yes, there has been a lot of progress and we have moved forward over the last year but there is certainly a lot more to do,” she concluded.

Also speaking at the conference, Jonathon Counsell, Group Head of Sustainability at International Airlines Group and Chair of the Jet Zero Council’s SAF Delivery Group, said that to achieve the 10% by 2030 target, five commercial-scale SAF production plants needed to be under construction by 2025.

“These plants will therefore need to hit financial close by mid-2024, so policies will need to be in legislation by the end of this year or certainly in the first half of next year,” he said.

“We recognise the mandate can create a demand signal but this needs to be supplemented by some form of price stability mechanism, such as we’ve seen in other renewable industries and we strongly feel it’s needed for SAF.”

To ensure price certainty and reduce investor risk, Counsell suggested a proven policy instrument such as Contracts for Difference should be implemented by the government.

The Jet Zero Council is a government/industry body set up in 2020 with the objective to accelerate delivery of net zero emissions for the UK aviation sector, with a focus on areas needing policy support. Counsell’s SAF Delivery Group has three sub-groups responsible for the mandate’s development, SAF commercialisation and technologies and feedstocks required for SAF production. Twelve financial institutions are now participating in the commercialisation sub-group, said Counsell.

He reported overseas interest in the JZC concept. “We have had conversations with other countries who would like to replicate the Council. We are supporting the establishment of a JZC in Australia and engaged in discussions with Spain and Ireland,” he said.

Ministers responsible for the Department for Transport and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy co-chair the Council. The latter was broken up in a reshuffle last week to create a new Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, which is led by former Transport Secretary, Grant Shapps.

Image (Boeing): Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787-9

Christopher Surgenor

Editor

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JetBlue has become the latest US carrier to offer its corporate customers the opportunity to reduce their business travel emissions through the purchase of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). Its new Sustainable Travel Partners programme also offers complimentary carbon offsetting on all domestic flights operated by JetBlue, personalised travel data and analysis for more accurate emissions reporting and consultation and tools for custom planning and target-setting to help support the partners in making more sustainable travel decisions. Launch customers for the programme include Biogen, Deloitte, ICF and Salesforce, who will be able to reduce their Scope 3 travel emissions through the purchase of JetBlue-generated SAF certificates, while assisting the airline to cover the current SAF cost premium. The programme’s partners will be helping source around 325,000 gallons of SAF, resulting in a reduction of 2,730 tonnes of CO2 emissions.

“As our business customers return to the skies, they increasingly have been asking for our support in meeting their net zero and sustainable travel goals,” said Sara Bogdan, JetBlue’s Director of Sustainability and Environmental Social Governance. “JetBlue has extensive expertise in decarbonising air travel thanks to our early and leading commitments and supply agreements. We’re now extending these options to our corporate customers so that for the first time, they can play a direct role in enhancing the sustainability of their air travel when flying with JetBlue.”

Since July 2020, the airline has used SAF as a component of its fuel supply from Neste out of San Francisco International Airport and, since July 2021, from World Energy on flights from Los Angeles International. It recently revealed a deal with SG Preston to purchase 67 million gallons of blended SAF a year for use at Northeast US airports over 10 years. The agreement brings JetBlue’s SAF offtake commitments based on a percentage of total fuel to around 8%, which it says is on track to meet its goal of converting 10% of total fuel use to SAF “years ahead” of its 2030 target.

Offering corporate customers the opportunity to purchase SAF certificates will not only help the airline cover the cost premium but also stimulate the emerging SAF market, said JetBlue, which it believes is critical for the aviation industry to reach its net zero goal.

Verification standards for SAF certificates are currently being formulated by the Roundtable on Sustainable Biomaterials (RSB) and the Sustainable Aviation Buyers Alliance (SABA). “We continue to monitor the evolution of the SAF certificate space and fully support the development of further structure around these certificates, and as founding members of the new SABA Aviators Group, we are able to remain engaged and adhere to these standards when they become available,” Bogdan told GreenAir.

“The certificates we are providing our corporate customers today are generated in-house at JetBlue and contain key data provided to us from our SAF producers. We are also managing a new inventory of SAF certificates to ensure we are closely accounting for each gallon of SAF delivered to us and associated certificates generated to ensure no double-selling.”

In building the programme, Bogdan said the airline wanted to go beyond just offering SAF certificates. “We recognise there’s no one solution to achieving net zero, so we designed it offering what we see as the key levers our partners can pull to further the sustainability of their corporate travel,” she said. “As a partner in this programme, our customers can purchase JetBlue-generated SAF certificates but they also have access to personalised emissions reporting on their JetBlue flights, expert guidance and target-setting support, along with our complimentary carbon offsetting of all domestic travel.”

In July 2020, JetBlue became the first US airline to voluntarily offset domestic CO2 emissions, purchasing offsets that are audited, verified and retired on its behalf by its three partners: Carbonfund.org, EcoAct and South Pole. Projects that reduce or avoid CO2 emissions are selected from around the world and focused on forestry, landfill gas capture, solar and wind.

“As Sustainable Travel Partners, JetBlue’s customers can benefit from enhanced reporting on our complimentary carbon offsets, as well as review opportunities to expand offsetting utilising our offsetting expertise and business partners,” said the airline.

JetBlue points out that business travellers have not previously had the ability to estimate their air travel emissions in a personalised, accurate or granular way.

“Through the programme, we are saving partners the effort of inaccurate guesswork by offering emissions reporting based on traveller’s actual flying and JetBlue’s average actual fuel burn on those routes,” it said. “Our intent is to provide partners with more accurate emissions reporting by sharing actual operational data, as well as incorporating the airline’s own emissions reduction initiatives into emissions reporting.”

JetBlue is also working to include travel emissions data into Salesforce’s Net Zero Cloud software, which it hopes to make available to the other programme partners. For corporate customers who purchase SAF certificates, JetBlue will also provide emissions reporting highlighting the estimated emissions reduction associated with the SAF.

“Whether an organisation is just starting to look at how they can implement sustainability goals and need some guidance or have an already developed sustainability programme with requirements for precision reporting, JetBlue seeks to approach each Sustainable Travel Partner as just that – a partner in our shared goal of making more sustainable travel decisions,” said Bogdan. “An example of this is our work with Salesforce to integrate JetBlue’s flight data into their Net Zero Cloud.”

Commented Patrick Flynn, VP and Global Head of Sustainability at Salesforce: “We are proud to join JetBlue’s Sustainable Travel Partners programme to help accelerate the aviation industry’s journey to net zero. The urgency of this climate emergency means we need all-of-the-above strategies. For us that includes helping incentivise emerging clean technologies like sustainable aviation fuels and working with partners like SABA to lower barriers to scale and cost reduction.”

Said ICF CEO John Wasson: “As the first professional services firm in the world to reach carbon neutral status in 2006, sustainability is part of our company’s DNA. As we continue to pursue our own ambitious carbon reduction targets, we’re thrilled to partner with JetBlue to help other companies achieve their sustainability targets too.”

Added Dr Alphonse Galdes, Head of Pharmaceutical Operations and Technology at Biogen: “Climate action is essential for human and planetary wellbeing. Yet if we hope to make a substantive impact in this area, we must come together across industries to re-examine the way we work, the way we live and the way we consume energy. By becoming an inaugural member of JetBlue’s programme, we are proud to reduce our dependency on fossil fuels and their associated impacts, as well as utilise more accurate data to inform travel decisions in the future.”

In November 2021, JetBlue joined SABA, a joint initiative with RMI, Environmental Defense Fund and a group of corporate travellers and US airline to help drive investment in high-integrity SAF. The previous month it became a launch member of the Aviation Climate Taskforce, a new non-profit organisation founded alongside nine other global airlines and Boston Consulting Group to accelerate breakthroughs in emerging technologies to decarbonise aviation.

Photo: JetBlue

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Bio-based feedstock availability for SAF will likely only be sufficient to supply 50% of the SAF required to meet IATA’s net zero carbon by 2050 target, concludes an ICF report prepared for the second edition of the cross-industry Air Transport Action Group’s Waypoint 2050 report. The other 50% of projected fuel demand by 2050 will have to come from Power-to-Liquid (PtL) technology, finds ICF. Although HEFA SAF is fully commercial and currently supplies most SAF, the availability of sustainable feedstocks will limit its overall contribution to SAF volumes to less than 10% by 2050. The Waypoint 2050 report estimates that 330-445 million tonnes of SAF, alongside technological and operational improvements, will be required for the global aviation industry to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050, reports Susan van Dyk. Speaking at the recent 2021 ATAG Global Sustainable Aviation Forum, Kata Cserep, ICF Global Managing Director of Aviation, said the ICF study set out to answer three simple questions: is there enough feedstock to produce the SAF required, how much will it cost, and where will it come from?

The size of the challenge is significant, said Cserep, and about 400 million tonnes (around 500 billion litres) of SAF will be required by 2050, representing an increase of 8000% from last year’s SAF production. But the ICF report shows that this can be done, she stated, mapping the pathway to achieve the projected quantities of SAF needed by 2050, including feedstock availability, number of production facilities and the total investment cost that will be required.

The projected volume of SAF by 2050 will depend on the extent that technologies such as hydrogen and electric aircraft can deliver emission reductions in the sector. Between 5,000 and 7,000 SAF production facilities will be required to deliver these volumes at a total infrastructure investment cost of $1-1.5 trillion dollars over 30 years. Put into perspective, explained Cserep, the annual investment cost will only be about 6% of historical annual investment in the oil and gas sector.

The regional distribution of feedstocks and SAF production forms a key part of the report as the nature of the feedstock dictates that production will take place closer to the sources of feedstock, making SAF production a more distributed energy source through all regions, unlike oil and gas which is highly concentrated in a few countries. The benefits of SAF also lie in its ability to create jobs, with 23 people employed today for every $1 million invested in bioenergy. SAF production at these levels will be able to sustain up to 14 million jobs in the collection and processing of the feedstock, with 90% of the jobs across the supply chain, said Cserep.

Feedstock availability is a prerequisite for SAF production. The WEF-CST report published earlier this year also analysed feedstock availability for SAF production, but did not take competing uses of feedstocks for bioenergy and other applications into account, according to Alastair Blanshard, Senior Manager and Sustainable Aviation Lead at ICF and the lead author on the ICF study.

As a result, the WEF-CST analysis concluded feedstock availability was not a limitation for SAF production and that enough biogenic feedstocks were available worldwide to produce about 500 million tonnes (621 billion litres) of SAF by 2050. In contrast, the ICF study built on bioenergy feedstock analysis by the IEA and Energy Transitions Commission to calculate that biogenic feedstocks will only be able to deliver about half of SAF requirements by 2050. Feedstocks assessed in the ICF report were limited based on sustainability and excluded crops such as vegetable oils, corn, sugarcane and others in keeping with the sector’s sustainability goals, explained Blanchard.

Under the most aggressive SAF deployment scenario, SAF can be delivered in three main phases (see graph below), Cserep told the ATAG Forum. The HEFA (Hydroprocessed Esters and Fatty Acids) process, which uses waste lipids, is the only commercial pathway today and is in a rapid scale-up phase. However, HEFA will become feedstock constrained, limiting it to less than 10% of total SAF production by 2050. The next two decades will be dominated by advanced feedstocks, such as municipal solid waste (MSW) and forest residues, and using technologies such as alcohol-to-jet (AtJ), Fischer-Tropsch (FT) and others. PtL technology is expected to start producing significant volumes after 2035. Although this technology does not require biogenic feedstocks, Blanshard estimates it will require eight TWh of renewable electricity to deliver projected 2050 volumes, which alongside electricity to charge battery and hybrid aircraft, is likely to be just under 10% of all renewable electricity.

The high cost of SAF is considered a significant obstacle for airlines. “The perception of cost is always the first stumbling block,” commented Blanshard. However, the ICF analysis demonstrates SAF production prices will decrease in all feedstock and technology combinations, driven by technology advances, economies of scale and increased carbon efficiency. When including the value of carbon, the fuel price is expected to be between $760-$900 per tonne of SAF by 2050, well within the historical range of fossil fuel.

The report did not address the policies required to achieve this level of SAF production, and analysis was based on a simplified policy environment with a global price on carbon, said Blanshard. Most thinking today is unfortunately based on volumes of fuel, rather than percentage carbon abated, he stated.

Significant policy developments have been taking place recently, including proposals for SAF blending mandates in Europe and the UK, and a SAF blenders tax credit in the USA. The proposed EU mandate is a volumetric mandate, whereas the UK mandate proposal prioritises carbon emissions savings through a GHG emissions scheme issuing credits proportional to the kilograms of CO2e saved. The US blenders tax credit and the California Low Carbon Fuel Standard similarly rewards greater carbon intensity reductions, spurring many companies in the US to target net zero SAF and even negative carbon intensity through measures such renewable electricity, green hydrogen and carbon capture and storage.

While the ICF report capped carbon intensity at a 100% reduction, negative carbon intensity SAF should be able to reduce the volumes required by 2050.

Top image: Shell

Susan van Dyk

GreenAir Correspondent

www.svdconsulting.ca

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Representing nearly 2,000 airports in 183 countries, trade body ACI World and its five ACI regions have set a global commitment to reach net zero emissions under the direct control of airport operators. ACI said airports were an integral part of the response to climate change, recognising that each airport, country and region was different, and the long-term aspirational goal was intended to be adopted by individual airports in accordance with local conditions to a timeline towards net zero by 2050 “that works for them”. To reach the target, airports could not do it alone, said ACI World Director General Luis Felipe de Oliveira, and they needed to work closely with the wider aviation community and count on the support of governments and key stakeholders. The long-term goal was agreed after a feasibility study conducted by ACI World with consultants ICF and Airbiz. A net zero by 2050 goal has already been committed to by 238 airports in Europe, with 91 airports pledging to achieve net zero by 2030.

“The aviation industry’s permission to operate and grow will only be granted when the communities we serve are an integral part of the work that airports, the wider aviation community and governments are doing, together with proactive climate action which is even more critical in the recovery efforts from the pandemic,” said de Oliveira, launching the net zero goal.

The long-term goal is in response to the IPCC’s Special Report in 2018 and after a group of airports urged ACI and its World Governing Body (WGB) to support airports taking urgent action by establishing an ambitious carbon goal commensurate with the report’s call for drastic reductions in global carbon emissions in line with the Paris Agreement. At a meeting in October 2019, the WGB agreed to support and commission a study, with ACI World appointing in February 2020 ICF and Airbiz to undertake it.

The purpose of the study was to:

• analyse the feasibility of a global decarbonisation by 2050 goal for ACI member airports;
• develop alongside the goal the appropriate pathway, resources and costs required to achieve it, considering regional differences and challenges faced by different airports based on size, geographic location, political circumstances and other differences; and
• identify the challenges that airports will face in different regions and make recommendations at a sectoral level as to how they might be overcome.

The study found that although Covid-19 had significant consequences for the aviation industry, including a recovery that is likely to result in an uneven resumption of airport investment, it had not derailed the commitment by most airports for lasting decarbonisation.

“The continuing and increasing focus on climate change and sustainable recovery lend further support to the value of a shared, credible and ambitious carbon goal for airports, led by ACI, as a driving force in the aviation sector,” says the study.

The goal is limited to scope 1 and scope 2 carbon emissions for which the airport operator is directly or indirectly responsible, so excludes emissions from aircraft operations, and is aspirational.

“It is not for ACI to enforce but rather will be a goal adopted by individual airports on a voluntary basis,” said the trade body. “ACI, in consultation with its regions and global membership, will review and update the goal every five years, to reflect latest policy, regulatory shifts, technology advancements, market conditions and scientific evidence, as well as public and stakeholder experience and expectations.”

In accounting for regional differences, the study acknowledges various roadmaps will be required to accommodate the diversity of the global airport membership, which are at different levels of carbon management maturity with different challenges, drivers and opportunities.

“The sectoral goal supports the faster and more ambitious goals already adopted by some members, while also reflecting that for some airports, meeting the net zero goal will prove challenging,” finds the study.

Kata Cserep, Global Managing Director for Aviation at ICF, told a webinar hosted by ACI World to launch the long-term goal: “It’s important to stress that it’s a common global goal but not the same goal for every airport. Our research and engagement with airports show very different journeys being experienced. There are airports who are already close to achieving net zero today but for numerous others, the decarbonisation journey has only just begun.”

In line with the IPCC reference point, the study established a 2010 baseline of 18.6 million tonnes of CO2e (Mt CO2e) emissions attributable to the global airport sector, with 10.3% of emissions from scope 1 sources and 89.7% from scope 2. Between 2010 and 2019, the absolute level of scope 1 and scope 2 emissions decreased slightly to 18.4 Mt CO2e, despite significant traffic growth. With activity expected to increase again post-Covid, if no further action is taken by airports, scope 1 and 2 emissions are forecast to rise to 24.9 Mt CO2e by 2050 on a business as usual (BAU) projection. Despite the impact of the pandemic, global airport traffic will continue to increase and is predicted to reach over 20 billion passengers by 2050. This is an activity increase of 150% with an expected emissions increase of 33%, but although this represents further decoupling of traffic and emissions growth, it still falls significantly short of the IPCC’s recommended 1.5 degree global warming mid-century limit, suggests the study.

The greatest source of carbon emissions for most airports is from purchased electricity generated off-site and reducing the carbon intensity of the electricity grid is outside the direct control of the airport operators. For other sources, the availability of finance, supportive business models and mature technological solutions will be required, it says.

It has come up with three emission reduction pathways, translated into interim reduction milestones for 2030, 2040 and 2050. A range of scenarios are defined through emission reduction measures (see figure below) and grid decarbonisation scenarios were developed bottom-up to compare to these outcome-driven emissions reduction pathways and test the technical feasibility of each pathway. No scope is allowed for carbon offsetting in the study and if emissions cannot be reduced to zero then only absolute reductions, or removals, through negative emissions technology are permitted by 2050, said Cserep.

To achieve the net zero goal will require shared policies and collaboration with industry, government and other stakeholders, and the study’s authors recommend seven actions and next steps for ACI to consider implementing:

• Adopt common goals amongst ACI member airports and reassess their feasibility periodically;
• Establish a voluntary mentorship programme;
• Develop an engagement strategy and toolkit;
• Develop a voluntary Airports Action Plan;
• Organise a biennial low carbon airport symposium;
• Support cost-benefit analysis studies to incentivise innovative business solutions; and
• Establish a global sustainable airports roundtable.

Governments and other stakeholders should play their part by:

• Supporting global grid decarbonisation;
• Supporting renewable energy transitions and the development of viable business cases and partnerships for decarbonisation measures;
• Supporting the development of negative emissions technologies commercial development as a gap filler; and
• Incentivising and facilitating airports’ access to green finance.

“The sustainability of the whole aviation sector is crucial for the present and future of the industry, it is our passport for a return to growth, and the industry has invested billions in measures and practices which have made significant progress in reducing its environmental impact,” said de Oliveira. “Through a combination of new technology, operational efficiencies and infrastructure improvements, more than 10 billion tonnes of CO2 have been averted by the industry since 1990, but we must build on this and accelerate our collective efforts to decarbonise.

“Airports cannot do this alone, however, and this is just the first step. If they are to realise this ambitious target, they must work closely with the wider aviation community and count on the support of governments and key stakeholders to address, minimise and mitigate the environmental impacts of continued aviation growth over the long term.”

Added Ken Conway, Head of Environment and Sustainability at Airbiz: “The cost of delaying action or doing nothing could be extremely high and what we want to avoid is the imposition of more aggressive carbon pricing initiatives, restrictive regulations and possible limits to growth. We have a unique opportunity to show we can really lead in the global response to climate change and join a growing community of states and other industries that have also taken similar steps. By aligning our net zero carbon goal to a pathway that is compatible with the Paris Agreement and the latest science, and by embracing all the opportunities to decarbonise the sector, we stand to benefit at all levels and continue to be seen to play a very important role in limiting a rise in global temperatures.”

Top image: ACI World

Webinar on ACI World’s global long-term carbon goal for airports: